Lawmakers meet Holder on Rosen e-mail search

6/28/13 1:09 PM EDT

Leaders of the House Judiciary Committee met with Attorney General Eric Holder Friday to discuss his testimony to that panel last month in which he said he'd never entertained or even "heard of" the idea of prosecuting a journalist for receiving classified information from a source.

Soon after Holder's testimony, the Washington Post disclosed that the Justice Department sought Fox News correspondent James Rosen 's e-mails by labeling him as a "co-conspirator" with "potential criminal liability" for soliciting classified information from State Department contractor Stephen Kim. Kim was eventually indicted; Rosen was not.

"Today we had a frank discussion with Attorney General Holder about his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee and the search warrant for James Rosen’s emails. The House Judiciary Committee intends to issue a report outlining its findings of its investigation into this matter," the lawmakers said. "We felt it was prudent to hold a private meeting with Attorney General Holder due to the pending prosecution of Mr. Kim. The private meeting afforded us the opportunity to ask Attorney General Holder substantive questions about the ongoing prosecution and the relationship between Mr. Kim and Mr. Rosen that he would not have been able to answer in a public setting.”

Some Republicans accused Holder of misleading the committee with his categorical denials about knowledge of any discussions about prosecuting journalists. Holder has acknowledged he had access to the paperwork on the Rosen search warrant and was briefed about the basis for it. However, Justice Department officials said he spoke truthfully at the hearing because the labeling of Rosen as a potential criminal was simply a legal tactic to access his email for use in the investigation.

Holder aides said have said the designation did not mean there was any proposal to prosecute Rosen. However, they have not flatly denied that there was any discussion about prosecuting Rosen. The Justice Department has said the investigation has concluded and no more indictments are expected.